


Where The Wild Things Go

by Kaiyou, skittidyne



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Accidental Curse, Adventure, Everyone Gets Lost, Fae & Fairies, Fairy Tale Elements, Fantasy, Gen, M/M, Shapeshifting
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-09-30
Updated: 2016-10-12
Packaged: 2018-08-18 18:02:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 15,517
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8170814
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kaiyou/pseuds/Kaiyou, https://archiveofourown.org/users/skittidyne/pseuds/skittidyne
Summary: A cat that likes to wander. A boy who doesn't know what he is. A sprite caught between duty and desire. A man perfectly happy in his everyday life. As their fates collide, the four will set out on an unexpected journey, and in the process they might just save the world.Or maybe not. Maybe they'll just be forced to listen to a ferociously off-key owlsong.Only time will tell.





	1. Cat's In The Cradle

Kenma never worried about getting lost.

Oh, he got lost, on a fairly regular basis. He was always out wandering, and getting distracted; emptying his mind of conscious thought as he let sensation and memory play together until what had been jumbled started to become aligned. There were just too many overwhelming things when he was with the others, too much noise, too many expectations, too many subtle looks and subconscious cues and the ever-present reminder that they spoke a language he’d never have full access to even if he tried. Everyone was kind, now. They even liked him. Joked with him. Protected him.

But only Kuroo understood him.

Kuroo always made sure that even if Kenma got lost, he never stayed lost.

So he never worried.

Tonight, the air was cool and buzzing with an undercurrent of activity. Kenma lifted a hand as he walked, fingers trailing through the slight breeze that pushed against him. The dirt of the road beneath his feet was a pale tan. He’d walked this way before. Possibly. Sometimes it was hard to tell one place from another. But the tree to his right looked familiar, with a crooked limb that reminded him of the feathered stick barb. He supposed it would be ironic if he’d seen it beforehand. He wondered if there were other trees deeper in the forest who grew with their own radicals, sharing a secret tree language that could only be read if you looked at things from the right angles.

It was an intriguing thought, but the wind was pulling him further down the road.

It had been a while since he’d seen another spirit. His ears flicked this way and that, trying to pick up on stray sounds. A quiet insect over there, giving out faint chirps. To his right, a faint rustling that might mean a rabbit or something else he could chase, if he shifted. He had no desire to chase right now, though. Well, not food, at any rate. There was something in the air. Something that kept tugging him forward. Some pulse, some energy.

He could almost taste it. He let his eyes fall shut and listened, wetting his lips. The feeling was almost like velvet in his mouth, the short strands catching on the rasps of his tongue. Except that wasn’t it. It was like sparks running up his arm, the crackle in the air before he pushed down on Kuroo’s bare skin, before Kuroo inhaled and exhaled pure heat.

It was something he wanted, and there was very little that Kenma wanted, so he indulged.

Leaves crackled beneath his feet as he left the road. He felt the roughness of bark beneath his fingertips. The green of freshly-broken plants wafted up from the floor of the forest, but none of the foliage hurt him. It brushed against him gently as he delved deeper into the forest. The wind pushed at his back, lifting the strands of his two-toned hair to caress his neck. He opened his eyes for just a moment, but the darkness was layering over itself as he walked. His other senses were more valuable to him now. The air thrummed beneath his palms, tickled the back of his throat as he breathed, brought him sounds he couldn’t quite make out. He could feel energy hopping through the fur on his ears. It crackled like lightning without the thunder.

There was some resistance as he pushed forward but it was soft, stretchy, like taffy that gave way at his insistence. Whatever he wanted, it was close, he could feel it. Close, and he wasn’t going to turn back now. He barely noticed when the rustle of leaves gave way to the rustling of pebbles. The smell of green things changed to something he hadn’t ever smelled before, something almost sour and smoky. He didn’t like it. But there, right above him he could feel the energy—glorious, in lines that made him want to reach up and wrap his hands around it. He opened his eyes—

And frowned, puzzled for a moment before pain radiated out from his knee.

Yelping, he looked down. There were square rocks in front of him. Square rocks that had been put together to form a wall about the height of his thigh. They were grey, and grainy to the touch, almost like they weren’t real rocks at all. Many rocks, mixed and held together. They felt dissonant.

The world around him was filled with dissonance.

Kenma frowned, and sat on the short wall, looking around. He didn’t recognize anything. He should’ve been able to see the forest he’d just walked through; he was fairly certain he hadn’t walked that far in this strange world. Instead, there was a dark straight road stretching as far as he could see in either direction, with buildings and other little roads jutting off of it. The energy he’d been chasing was right above him in black lines held up by tall wooden trees without leaves. Dead trees. There were lights along the road. Lights that fed off the energy. They were yellow, and didn’t say everything that light could say.

This was a strange place.

He hoped Kuroo would find him soon.

The sky was even stranger. There were stars, but it was like someone had painted over whole swaths of them with darkness. The ones he could see he didn’t recognize. The one moon that hung in the sky looked at least somewhat familiar, though he missed the other moon, small and blue. Somehow he’d managed to get himself very lost indeed.

A crunching sound on the pavement behind him made him jump.

Turning to look, he widened his eyes. There was someone there. Someone with flaming hair, and large eyes, who was looking right at him. It didn’t feel like anything that Kenma had ever come across before—no spirit, no yokai, no fae, nothing. It moved, and Kenma held very still, ears pressed tight against the top of his head. It was only the swishing of his tail that gave away his nervousness.

“Hey!” the creature said.

Kenma’s eyes widened. Was that a word, or just a random sound? It looked a bit like a person, but it could just be mimicking intelligence.

“Ah,” said the creature, crouching down near Kenma, “are you ok? You look a little scared. I haven’t seen you before. I thought I knew all of us in this area. Are you traveling? Did you get lost?”

“Lost,” Kenma said, looking away with a shrug. He wished he had something else to focus on besides this intense stranger.

“Oh, oh no. Um, can I help? I’m Hinata Shouyou by the way.”

Kenma tilted his head to the side. The creature had a name. Kenma decided it was intelligent, at least to some degree, and it didn’t want to harm him. So, politeness. Names. “Ah, Kozume,” he murmured. “Kozume Kenma.”

“Kenma, like polishing? You make things smooth?”

Kenma shrugged. “Yes,” he finally said. He had no idea what Shouyou meant.

The whole notion of Shouyou was rather overwhelming, really. The creature just started talking randomly. Its voice was full of excitement, jumping from topic to topic. Kenma decided after a couple minutes that Shouyou was probably a boy. It was still debatable, but he didn’t want to ask, and it was easier to just go with it.

Kenma broke into Hinata’s monologue and asked, “Where are we?”

“Huh? Oh, Torono. It’s in Miyagi.”

Kenma blinked. Neither word sounded even vaguely familiar. “Ah—”

“It’s in Japan?” Shouyou said.

Well that at least made sense. But this wasn’t Kenma’s Japan. In fact—

He looked around again, noticing the straight lines and all the black and grey on the ground. The smells in the air were dirty. The sky was hazy. Were they— “Is this the human side?” he asked finally, stunned a bit at the possibility.

“Well,” Shouyou said, “yeah?”

Kenma felt his stomach start to curl in on itself. He was a lot more lost than he thought.

Shouyou sat down next to him, tilting his head forward so he could look up past Kenma’s hair. “Are you sure you’re ok? I can take you to someone who can help.”

“No,” Kenma said, staring down at the red line inked along his inner forearm. “Kuro will find me.”

“Ok, I’ll wait with you,” Shouyou said.

Kuroo always found him.

Kuroo always looked for him, made sure he was safe. Protected him even though Kenma didn’t really need protecting. But Kuroo was always there. No matter how far off Kenma wandered, Kuroo always found him and brought him back.

But as the moon continued its solo walk across the sky, it became apparent that maybe this time, Kenma had gotten himself too lost for Kuroo to find.

After a while, Shouyou broke his monologue about things Kenma didn’t understand to lean forward again, hesitance apparent in the intake of his breath. “Are you sure you don’t want me to take you to someone who can help?” he asked.

Kenma swallowed, and looked down at his hands, thumb tracing up and down the red line that connected him to Kuroo. Something was wrong, and he couldn’t rely on Kuroo to fix it all the time. Sighing, he nodded and said, “Okay.”

 

—

 

Human beings were beautiful.

Not all of them, of course—some were nasty and ugly and mean. But not the man that Suga was watching. No, Daichi Sawamura was kind and gentle. The type of man to help right a turtle that had been flipped over onto its back—Suga knew, he was the one who’d flipped it over. But apart from all of his many admirable personal characteristics, Daichi was unquestionably one of the most gorgeous humans Suga had ever laid eyes on. So he took the opportunity to lay eyes on him as often as possible.

Currently, he was appreciating the fact that Daichi had a strong commitment to his own health. Tonight, this came out with the help of a bar wedged into the doorway of his bedroom. His hands were wrapped around it, pulling him up until his chin was above the bar. This allowed Suga the perfect view of muscles flexing under dark skin. He’d never appreciated human anatomy quite so much. He only wished that his view extended a little further down, to where the soft grey sweatpants were covering what he was fairly certain must be must be another spectacular example of the pinnacle of human form. Maybe if he—

“Suga!”

Startled, Suga let go of the branch he was clinging to and whirled around, wondering who had caught him staring. The movement threw him off-balance and he felt gravity tugging him toward the ground in a way he was not entirely comfortable with. At all. The foliage around him got in the way of him extending his wings until he was almost to the ground, which mean crashing. Almost crashing. Rolling until he came to a mildly undignified stop in front of the offending party.

“Hinata!” Suga said, staring up at the redhead and trying to keep his annoyance under control. “What—”

“I’m sorry! I—”

“Hey, what’s going on out here!” came a voice that Suga loved and really didn’t want to hear at this moment.

His glamour was down. Daichi hadn’t ever seen him like this. Daichi would know what he was, that he’d been spying on him, would hate him, might step on him—

“Ooof.”

Suga stared at the body of the man who’d just crashed through the house’s front door. “Oh, shit.”

He really hadn’t meant to do that.

Daichi’s beautiful male body was now sprawled out on the ground at the bottom of the steps, still glorious but now very very still. His spirit, on the other hand, was standing over it looking very very confused.

“Ah,” Hinata said, “I thought we weren’t supposed to use curses on people? Which one was that, anyways?”

Gaping at Suga, Daichi said, “You cursed me?”

“It was an accident!” Suga exclaimed, feeling extremely sheepish as he glanced from his crush to his kohai to the stranger behind Hinata who was currently the living embodiment of uncomfortable. “And, uh. I’m not sure.”

“I thought you were my mailman,” Daichi said, looking paler than Suga had ever seen him.

“Ah,” Suga said, shrugging, “Sometimes? Kinda sorta? I sub in.” Well, steal the mail from the regular man’s truck so that he could deliver it himself, but Daichi didn’t need to know that. Daichi should never have known about any of this. Suga was supposed to be an upstanding leader in Ukai’s fae court, not—well—this.

“You can fix him though, right?” Hinata whispered, brown eyes wide as he stared at the spirit and his body.

“Of course,” Suga said, feigning confidence he didn’t really have. He tried to think back to exactly what curse he’d thrown at Daichi to make him decorporealize like that. Maybe something he’d learned in his lessons a long time ago? Maybe a mix of things? Nothing was coming to mind. Instead he was distracted again by the stranger behind Hinata. Fae, that much was obvious from the ears and the tail—but no one he’d ever seen. There was something wild about him, like wisps of smoke that curled out from his being just beyond what Suga could see. “Who’s your friend?”

“What? Oh, that’s Kenma. He’s lost. I said you could help him get home.”

Of course he had. Of course, because Suga was the smart one, the capable one, the one everyone could rely on to have the answers.

Cursing the human he’d been spying on didn’t quite fit into that definition, but hey. Fae were complex, right?

“Um, excuse me,” Daichi said, “Can you, um.”

Suga looked back over, watching the spirit kneel next to his body. He was pushing his hand into it, turning a faint green as it disappeared inside without any resistance.

“Oh,” Suga murmured. “Yeah.”

Feeling guilty, he walked over, and crouched down near Daichi’s body. It was as beautiful up close as he’d always imagined. Sweat still glistened off the muscles of his back, though the view was marred by the sight of an arm sticking out of the middle of his spine. Swallowing, Suga reached out, not looking at the spirit as he turned the body over onto its back. Fortunately, Daichi’s nose was unbroken. The only damage was a slight scrape on his chin and his palms—maybe the body had reached out to catch itself on instinct. It was still breathing, but the eyes were closed, unseeing.

“Maybe if he just like, you know, lay down in it?” Hinata suggested.

“Sure, I can try that,” Daichi said, moving to do just that.

He should’ve been freaking out. He should’ve been yelling, or screaming, or maybe even crying. Didn’t humans cry when they were scared? Maybe he was in shock. How were humans supposed to react to all this?

If he had been screaming, maybe Suga could’ve screamed too.

He wanted to.

This whole situation was surreal, even for him. He’d just cursed a guy, and that guy was now a spirit imperfectly situating himself in his body.

“Like this?” Daichi said, and man was it ever disconcerting to see a mouth move on top of a mouth.

“I’m not sure that will work,” the new guy said. Kenma. His name was Kenma.

Suga looked up at him, but the blond was looking away from everyone, fingers twisting against fingers as he stood a few feet behind Hinata. He was fairly certain he agreed with the man.

“Ah,” Suga said, reaching out and touching Daichi’s chest, “maybe if I—”

He ran through a few simple cleansing spells in his head. Nothing. Not even a hint that what he was saying was working. He pulled more complex spells from his brain, trying to tie the spirit to the body.

“Ouch!” Daichi said, wincing after one try did nothing but raise a slight welt in the middle of the perfect chest under Suga’s fingers. “Um, is it just me, or…”

“It’s not working,” Suga sighed, frowning and murmuring a short healing spell to soothe the blistered skin. “Fu—ah—udge.”

“Oh,” said Daichi, blinking eyes that were still beautiful even if they were laid over the closed eyelids of unanimated flesh. “So, what now?”

Scrunching up his nose, Suga said, “Now, we pull out the big guns.”

“We go talk to Ukai?” Hinata asked.

“Yeah,” Suga answered, internally wincing at the dressing down he’d probably get for his foolish mistake. “We’ll go to Ukai. He’ll be the best one to help Kenma anyways. Just, ah, think of it as an adventure!”

“An adventure,” Daichi said, sitting up with his legs still half in his body.

“Yeah,” Suga said, feeling slightly nervous at the look that the human was giving him. “Or, you could think about it like a dream maybe? A very real-feeling dream?”

“I’m pretty sure I’m not supposed to be dreaming about my mailman,” Daichi said.

There was something unreadable in his tone. Coupled with the directness of Daichi’s gaze, it made Suga’s cheeks heat up, and he glanced around, throwing a brilliant smile at Kenma. “It’ll be fine! We’ll get Kenma home, we’ll get you back in your body—well, we should probably put your body in bed first, yeah.”

“Uh-huh,” Daichi said, voice deep enough to make Suga shiver.

This was so not the way he’d wanted to get Daichi into bed.

But beggars can’t be choosers, right?

And they’d be fine.

Ukai would fix everything.

He was almost sure of it.

 

—

 

Kenma didn’t know what to make of the man Sugawara had brought them to, outside of a general first impression of _messy_. All manner of items cluttered the shelves, only some of them magical or otherworldly. He thought this was a store, actually, but how anyone could find anything in _that_ jumble was beyond him. The place stunk of old magic and humans.

Kenma, at least, kept his thoughts to himself. He hoped none of them were fluent enough in fae behavior to recognize the twitching of his tail that he couldn’t restrain.

He caught the human watching him, anyway, and Kenma shuffled closer to Shouyou with a nervous squint at him.

This was already a little too crowded for his tastes, but he trusted Shouyou as far as believing he wanted to help. He seemed to be made of earnestness and sincerity, and Kenma truly wanted to believe the best of Sugawara as well, curse incidents notwithstanding. But if this chain of ‘help’ continued growing, he was probably better off on his own.

Maybe, he was something like desperate. Kenma never worried about Kuroo finding him, and he rubbed at the red line on his arm again, hoping the movement came off as a fidget. His tail flicked behind him once more.

 _Kuro will find me_ , he thought, a little more hesitantly that time. Kuroo _hadn’t_ , yet. That still felt a little off to Kenma, but he could do nothing about it until he got back. Maybe he’d have to sulk, maybe Kuroo would apologize, maybe something went wrong. Nerves prickled up his spine at the half-formed thought; he pushed it down, again. _Or… maybe I’ll find Kuro_. Either way, he would get home.

How much trouble could a single boy get into by himself?

Well, he had one of whatever creature Shouyou was, one fairy, one cursed human, and now another man in a cluttered and stinking shop. Maybe, just maybe, this is what it was like when things spiralled out of control. Kenma was used to more Kuroo in those incidents in the past.

He didn’t feel comfortable here. Kenma looked everywhere but at the Ukai man Sugawara spoke to, though the clutter didn’t interest him. Perhaps if he shifted, he could find some small, dark place to hide in. The thought was not without its appeal, but he wanted to go home most of all.

At the very least, out of the human side again. The air tasted bad on his tongue and everything still felt off enough that it made his fur want to rise. Even after this much time spent there, Kenma definitely did not come to appreciate the blanket-like muffledness of the world.

He completely tuned out Sugawara’s embarrassed but honest explanation of what had happened and the resulting scolding. He felt sorry for the human, kind of, in the way Kuroo sometimes felt sorry if they came across a bird with a broken wing. Usually they ended up killing and eating those, but they made it painless.

“Cat, I’m _talking_ to you.”

Kenma jolted to attention, ears pricked, eyes wide. “Um.” He looked up at Ukai with a nervous swish of his tail, then looked away again not a moment later, and Sugawara’s smile tightened at the corners. “What?”

“How did you get here?” Ukai repeated, and he folded his arms across his chest. Shouyou looked back and forth between them.

“I don’t know,” Kenma mumbled.

“Does Nekomata know you’re here?”

Kenma risked a glance directly up at him. “You know Nekomata…?”

Ukai looked as if he dearly wished he didn’t. He grinned, and Kenma was somehow scared of the grin, despite the fact that he could _probably_ escape from the messy shop without getting caught. He hoped. “Sometimes wish I didn’t. Is that old tomcat still in charge of you?”

“Kind of.” He didn’t want to ask how he knew him, or give away too much of their own information. Fae lived a long time, but Nekomata was still _old_.

“Well, he owes my family a favor, and tell him I’m going to collect. Especially since I’ll be sending you back to him in one piece,” Ukai declared, and Kenma peeked up at him once more, delicate hope rising in his chest. “I can’t help with this curse nonsense, but I think he might. He knows plenty of things, too many probably, but curses have to be among that. I’m sending Sugawara and Sawamura with you.”

Kenma first glanced at Shouyou, whose immediately crestfallen expression was almost cute, and then over at Sugawara, who looked about as nervous at bringing a human—even a newly ghostly one—into the fairy realm as Kenma was beginning to feel. “What about me?” Shouyou demanded, and brought Kenma’s attention back to him.

“What _about_ you?” Ukai asked gruffly, though not unkindly.

“If this old guy knows stuff about all kinds of things, then I want to ask him stuff!” Shouyou insisted. Kenma watches him out of the corner of his eye, curious. The feeling only intensified when Shouyou added, “Maybe he’d know what I am!”

“You’re not a fairy,” Ukai flatly replied.

Sugawara hid a smile behind his hand, but his eyes were borderline sympathetic. Perhaps pitying. Kenma didn’t feel so bad for not being able to figure out what Shouyou was when even he, apparently, did not know.

Just as he opened his mouth to point out that Nekomata probably _would_ help if Kenma asked (and he thought he would, to return the favor), Ukai continued. “Hinata, we’ve had this discussion before.”

“It’s not exactly an easy trip,” Sugawara added, hesitant and delicate, like he didn’t want to hurt Shouyou’s feelings. Kenma didn’t like it, but he understood, especially when Shouyou turned to Sugawara with indignation and outrage written across his face. “I think Ukai’s right. We already have to keep an eye on Daichi, and cat fae are known to be a little finicky—no offense.”

Kenma shrugged. He’d been called worse.

“I can ask him something, for you,” Sugawara finished.

“But how can he know what I am if he doesn’t see me?” Shouyou persisted. Kenma started to hope he wouldn’t turn those big, pleading eyes on _him_ , because he didn’t really understand how the others could turn him down repeatedly. Even the human looked a little put-out by it.

Kenma wondered how often Shouyou asked about these sorts of things, and then wondered what the harm was in allowing him to come. He wouldn’t be any more of a burden than hauling a cursed human through the fae realm, surely.

“We can only ask him for so much help outright. Maybe, in the future, we can pull some strings or something, but trying to fix a curse is a little more pressing than you wanting to learn how to fly again,” Ukai told him. The man pulled a back of cigarettes from his apron with a world-weary sigh, and lit one with a spark of fire over his finger. “Maybe your new cat friend could ask. I don’t know. We can’t ask for anything more right now, so just stay put, kid.”

That was definitely a conversation they’ve had before. Shouyou’s entire being drooped; Kenma could practically see his entire aura grow despondent. He chewed on his lip as Sugawara gently herded he and the human from the shop, leaving Shouyou behind.

Kenma felt it—senses dulled as they were he wasn’t blind, nor _dumb_ —when someone else slipped out of the shop after them.

Probably better not to say anything.

 

—

 

Maybe he was just dreaming.

That explanation held quite a bit of appeal. He hadn’t said it out loud, of course, but he was fairly certain that at least a couple of his dreams lately had included the silver-haired postman now known as Suga. There had been a certain ethereal charm to the man, beyond looks and the fact that it seemed like he might actually think that Daichi was attractive. But it had all just been idle fantasy. Nothing he had pursued because, well, the man was a real person and it was impolite to fantasize about real people—much—but it wasn’t like he could actually control what happened in his mind when he was unconscious. So yeah, dreaming was not a bad option.

Other than the fact that he was fairly certain that he’d never had a dream this vivid, and half of the things they were passing he’d never seen the likes of before. The Suga of his dreams definitely didn’t have delicate butterfly wings, and he was fairly certain he was just a little bit taller. Maybe his mind was putting things together? He had seen that magical girl series where the characters had cat ears and tails, but he was fairly certain he would remember if any of the characters were ombre boys.

The dark tunnels they were traveling through were new to him as well. At first their journey had been relatively unremarkable. Just a trip down to the subway station—not something Daichi did every day, but he had been known to do it. But then once in the subway station they’d ducked down a hall he hadn’t ever taken, and then gone through a maintenance door and down a rickety black spiral staircase that opened up into a dark tunnel lit with green overhead fluorescent lights. Gravel lined the bottom of the tunnel, and it crunched under Suga and Kenma’s feet.

It did not crunch under Daichi’s feet. In fact, it took a certain amount of concentration to make sure that his feet didn’t start sinking into the floor.

“You doing ok?” Suga asked, glancing up at him with worried eyes.

He should be angry at Suga. Hell, he’d basically let himself get kidnapped by these strange people, and was in the process of being pulled even further down the rabbit hole, so why wasn’t he angry? Even if Suga was attractive, that didn’t excuse the fact that he’d knocked Daichi out of his body like—what was a good metaphor? A semi knocking a driver out of their car? Toothpaste squeezed out of the tube?

Ugh.

Suga was looking at him, waiting for an answer. He shrugged. “Fine, I guess,” he said, instantly not fine when he realized he’d just walked through a low retaining wall instead of going around it.

“Right,” Suga said, looking down. “I’m sorry again.”

“What were you doing outside my house in the middle of the night anyways?” Daichi asked.

“Oh, that. Well, you see,” Suga started, color dusting his cheeks.

“Yes?”

“Uh. Fae business.”

Daichi raised an eyebrow, suspicious. “Fae business.”

“Yeah.”

It sounded like bullshit. Daichi glanced at Kenma to see if he would provide any help, but the boy didn’t seem to be paying them much attention. He kept glancing back and then down to the ground, tail twitching behind him. Tail. An actual tail. An actual tail that moved of its own accord. If this was a dream it was one hell of a dream.

“Can you fly?” Daichi asked. Suga seemed to be stubborn about his secretiveness. Frankly Daichi would like to at least get to learn something about the other man, even if he was holding his tongue in some areas.

He wasn’t expecting the worried look Suga shot him at his question.

“Uh,” Suga said, “Yes, but—uh, I don’t fly into trees, there’s not enough space to move my wings.”

“Why would I think you flew into trees?” Daichi asked, puzzled.

“Oh! Oh, uh, well, no reason,” Suga answered, looking visibly relieved.

That just made Daichi even more suspicious. Had Suga been up in a tree? Wait, there was a tree right outside his bedroom window? Frowning, Daichi asked, “Were you up in my tree?”

Suga stopped and turned, staring at him with wide eyes full of guilt. “I…”

That was creepy. It should be creepy. Just because Suga was cute like this, brown eyes wide and little antennae rising from beneath his grey hair—

Wait, antennae?

Uh…

Suddenly Suga’s gaze shifted to something behind Daichi, eyes narrowing in suspicion. “Hinata! I know you’re back there!”

“Ack!” came a voice from behind them.

Daichi turned, watching as the redhead came into view, sheepishly rubbing the back of his neck.

“Ah,” Hinata said, “Hi Suga, Kenma. Daichi. So you guys are safe, I see.”

Huffing, Suga said, “Of course we’re safe! What are you doing here anyway? Didn’t Ukai order you to stay home?”

Beside them Kenma’s shoulders were shaking in what Daichi realized was silent laughter. The blond had a hand raised to cover his mouth, but he could see the corner of a smile peeking out beside his fingertips.

“Well,” Hinata sputtered, “Well it seemed like this was the right thing to do! I’m not hurting anything, right? I mean, I’m just making sure you get safely to the gate.”

“Right,” Suga replied, scowling. Then he frowned, glancing at Daichi and Kenma before looking back at Hinata. “Hinata, I know you want to find out about what you are, but being on the other side is dangerous.”

“Please? I’ll be good. I’ll help. I won’t cause any problems. And I’m, well, I’ll do anything!”

“Nekomata does know a lot,” Kenma volunteered.

“See? See? Kenma wants me to come, right Kenma?” Daichi watched as Hinata bounced over close to Kenma, who shied away a moment before tilting his head and giving a small nod. “Yes! I knew it.”

“Well,” Suga said, chewing his bottom lip, “we are pretty deep in the tunnels now.”

“Yeah,” Hinata said, nodding. “I have no idea how to get back.”

Sighing, Suga said, “You should’ve thought of that before. But, well I guess, okay. I mean, we are almost at the gate.”

“Really? You’ll really let me come?” Hinata asked, glancing at Kenma, who shot him another of those tiny smiles.

“I guess,” Suga murmured, shoulders slumping as he turned towards the wall. “Since, well, we’re here.”

He lifted his hand and pressed it against the wall. Blue light radiated out from the point of contact, fragmenting in different directions until it reached the limits of a circle that had been set into the cement.

“Woah,” Hinata gasped. “So cool! I want to learn to do that!”

“It’s nothing special,” Suga said, but his wings were fluttering slightly with the praise. He glanced back over at Daichi, who couldn’t help but smile in return. It was strange, and crazy, and like something out of a movie, but it _was_ pretty cool.

Humming a soft tune, Suga turned back to the wall. “Well, alright then,” he said, twisting his fingers. Bright green light flooded the spaces between the blue cracks, and Daichi heard a soft _whomp_ as the colors blended together into a silvery grey. Suga pressed his fingers against the surface and they slid inside.

Daichi swallowed. This was crazy. This was real. He was about to take a step forward from his world into something completely unknown, following a man who had almost admitted to basically stalking him. This was insane. He should be terrified.

Instead, he found more than anything that he was just a little bit excited.

“Well,” he said, trying to clamp down on his nervousness, “off to see the wizard, I guess?”

Suga turned to him and laughed, flashing a smile that did things to Daichi’s insides he didn’t want to process at the moment. “Yeah,” he said. “I guess you could say that.”

“Yeah! Let’s go!” Hinata said.

Turning once again to the circle on the wall, Suga nodded. “Let’s.”

Then he stepped forward into nothingness, and Daichi followed.

 

—

 

Nekomata’s place was not like what Hinata had been expecting. He’d always thought that fae courts in the other world would be shining and silvery and elegant and lofty, like some shimmering expanse of water frozen into shapes that defied imagination. Or maybe the opposite, some deep dark cavernous space filled with shimmering crystals, suspended above bubbling lava that shot into the air at random intervals. Nekomata’s place was nothing like that. Instead, it basically seemed like a house in the classic Japanese style, with tatami floors and sliding walls that opened out onto a garden grown wild with plants Hinata had never even seen.

It wasn’t that the house wasn’t grand in its own right, it was just, well. Smaller than he was expecting.

A light brown cat shot him a dirty look, almost as if it could read his mind. Hinata cringed and gave it a short wave before looking around again.

There were cats everywhere. Tiny cats, big cats, spiky cats, fluffy cats. A long grey cat was playing out in the garden, jumping up into the air as it bounced over the bushes. A large black and yellow tiger sat behind Nekomata giving everyone a fierce look. For some reason it reminded Hinata of Tanaka. Kenma, sitting on the floor near Nekomata, held a dark grey cat in his arms. There was even a cat that almost looked like a dog.

“I appreciate you bringing me my wayward child, Sugawara of Karasuno,” Nekomata was saying. “However, you do realize you have come asking for two favors—well three, since I'm assuming Ukai wants to keep this business with the human hidden from the high council. But I'll let that go. Still, these are both things not to be taken lightly.”

“I realize that, sir,” Suga said, shooting Hinata a dirty look. “We will be grateful for any help you can provide.”

“Hmph. Well I—eh?” Nekomata asked, glancing down to where Kenma was tugging at the hem of his robe. “Oh, it's like that, is it?”

Kenma nodded.

“Alright, fine,” Nekomata said, looking back at Suga. “But in exchange, since you are asking me an extra favor, I will ask another one of you.”

“But Ukai already said you owed us a favor! And you thanked us yourself for bringing Kenma back,” Suga said.

“Are you saying you would not have brought him back if you didn't think you would get something for it?”

“Well, no.”

“See, that is that and this is this. And the favor I need won't be anything too strenuous,” Nekomata said, cocking his head to the side. “Well, probably.”

Sighing, Suga lowered his head in defeat. “Fine,” he said. “It was my decision to bring Hinata along anyway. So, do you know what Hinata is?”

A bubble of excitement rose in Hinata’s chest. Finally, finally he would know what he was!

“First things first,” Nekomata said. “Let's deal with the human.”

Or not.

Sighing internally, Hinata watched as Nekomata turned to a table near him and picked up a ripe cherry. He said a few words over it and the cherry began to give off an icy blue glow.

“Alright,” Nekomata said, turning around and holding the cherry out to Daichi. “Can you hold this?”

Daichi reached out. His fingers passed right brought the cherry stem, but came in contact with the fruit itself. Startled, he picked it up.

“Good, good,” Nekomata said. “Now eat it.”

“What? Wait, no!” Suga said, glaring at Nekomata. “That's cheating.”

Nekomata laughed. “You didn't teach him about fairy rules?”

“Well I didn't think we'd be staying long enough for him to need food!”

“Be careful, or I'll think you almost insulted my hospitality. But, ah well. I suppose he'd be a better crow than cat anyways.”

“Crow?” Daichi asked, staring at Nekomata suspiciously and backing away as the older man started towards him.

“Oh please. Relax. It's a figure of speech mainly, and you need to hold still for this next part.”

Daichi watched carefully as Nekomata murmured a few more words. His time his fingertips were the things starting to glow. He pressed them against Daichi's chest. There was a slight fizzing sound, then, Daichi gasped, pulling away from Nekomata and running into Hinata in the process.

“Hey!” Hinata said. “You got your body back?”

“Not exactly,” Nekomata replied, “but it will do for now. As long as that mark is on his skin, he will be solid in these lands. He can even eat and drink—it won't bind him, either. Tora, go get him a shirt, I'm too old to be looking at half-naked young men like this.”

“So cool!” Hinata said, watching as the tiger padded away, and then, looking up at the black crow edged into Daichi’s pectoral muscle.

“While in these lands?” Suga asked.

“Ah, well, yes. You see, the favor I need from you—you'll need to complete it first before I can finish my work on your friend.”

“Oh,” Suga said.

“And me?” Hinata asked. Looking up at Nekomata with wide eyes. “Are you going to tell me what I am?”

Nekomata looked down at him in return, ancient and wise. Hinata gulped. “You will find the answers you seek upon your journey,” he intoned, and his lips twitched in a grin. “Probably. If not, I'll help you when you get back, shortie.”

“Hey! I'm not that short!”

Kenma was giggling. Actually giggling, with actual sounds. It almost made up for Hinata's disappointment.

“Fine, you old—ah—sir,” Suga said. “So what is this favor, anyways?”

Nekomata shot him a crafty grin. ”It appears that one of my court has gone missing. I need you to take Kenma and go find him.”

“Who?” Suga asked, looking down when Kenma let out a sharp gasp.

“Kuro,” Kenma said, more emotion in his voice than Hinata had yet heard.

Nekomata looked down, eyes kind. “I'm afraid so,” he said. “But Kuroo is good at taking care of himself, and you two have always been pulled toward each other, so I'm sure you can find him—just like he has found you so many times over the years.”

Eyes turning steely, Kenma swallowed and nodded in agreement. “Okay.”

“Yeah!” Hinata said, looking to Suga and Daichi.

Suga hesitated only a moment, glancing at Daichi, who nodded at him. “Well, alright. Let's go find your friend.”


	2. Bird In The Cage

“I think… this looks familiar?” Kenma guessed, head cocked to the side. Daichi made a faint noise of disbelief and Kenma’s ears flattened. Things had been getting better since crossing back over into his home realm, but with Kuroo gone, things still felt off. Kenma rubbed his wrist beneath his sleeve and studied the trees a little bit harder.

In a general sense, he knew where they were. As kittens, he and Kuroo would explore far and wide together, even if he had been a less than enthused participant at the time. Kenma scanned the trees, then the path, looking for _some_ clue. He hadn’t been paying attention when he’d come through here—well, that’d been how he’d gotten lost—but he _thought_ this was the right place. It still sung faintly of Kuroo.

_Had he been looking for me?_ The news of Kuroo’s disappearance didn’t sit well with Kenma, and more time to think hadn’t done him much good. Shouyou’s conversation, at least, helped with that.

As if on cue, Shouyou bobbed up beside him, eyes bright and wide with wonder. “Do you think your friend was here? Is this some place you two came to a lot together?”

Kenma, for some reason he didn’t understand, frowned and flicked his tail. “We went all over. Cats roam.”

“It must be cool to travel.”

“When you’re not getting lost,” Sugawara chimed in, not meanly, but Kenma still felt his shoulders hunch. “It must be difficult, living full time in the fairy realm.”

“Weren’t you born here?” Daichi asked.

“Yes, but things get strange if you leave them for too long.”

Kenma had hardly been gone a day, but things already felt weird. He hummed and continued along the path with silent steps. Shouyou bounced alongside him, louder (naturally) and brighter. He seemed to like the strange trees, and Kenma even pointed out a couple he knew.

“My favorite tree is back in the direction of where we met with Nekomata,” Kenma told him, after introducing him to a willow tree that waved back at them and spooked the human. “It liked to have cats sleeping on its roots, because we were warm.”

“You’re friends with _trees_?”

“I guess.”

“That’s so cool!” Apparently, according to Shouyou, most of the realm was _so cool_.

Kenma felt his cheeks heat up a little, anyway. He liked Shouyou’s enthusiasm. It made him a little more glad to be home, too, even if he wasn’t _home_ -home until they tracked down wherever Kuroo vanished to.

He didn’t realize he was frowning again until Shouyou tugged on his hand and, with a grin, asked, “Can you introduce me to that tree on the way back?”

“…Sure,” Kenma agreed with another small smile.

They continued walking, at a pace slow enough for Shouyou to flit about and stray from the path—they mostly took equal turns calling him back—but quick enough that Kenma didn’t feel restless. The familiarity of the area was nice, comforting even, but he felt strange traveling with these people and still unable to find Kuroo. Kenma hadn’t gotten _that_ lost. …Okay, ending up in another realm was pretty bad, a personal worst, but that was no excuse for Kuroo to go and get himself lost, too.

Wait.

Kenma faltered, just enough for Shouyou to pull ahead of him (again).

He _recognized_ that crooked tree branch.

Ears perked, Kenma came up to the tree, standing on the tips of his toes with his tail held out for balance as he reached for the somewhat familiar branch. It kind of looked like…

“I think this is where I passed through,” Kenma said, not really meaning to speak aloud. He jumped when Sugawara leaned over his shoulder.

“This is pretty far from any doors or paths I’ve heard of,” he hummed and ran his fingers down the rough bark. It shone, briefly, before fading back to dark brown. “Huh. You’re sure?”

“I recognize this place.”

“So if your friend was following you…”

“Then he probably came this way,” Kenma said.

Sugawara nodded, and finally drew back. Kenma immediately skittered back to Shouyou’s side. “Well, that’s good. I’m not the best with directions out here, and I don’t think anyone would be happy if we _all_ ended up lost.”

“Lost and cursed,” Daichi muttered. “Not what I was expecting for my weekend.”

“Think of it as an adventure!” Suga cheered.

“An adventure for knowledge, and lost people, and magic!” Shouyou agreed, even louder, bouncing in place. “C’mon, let’s keep going! Your friend has to be around here somewhere, then?”

Kenma rubbed at his wrist. Kuroo didn’t feel any closer than he had before, but there’s no way he would have been unable to follow Kenma at least that far. It would’ve been kind of funny if he ended up in the human world, too, and they’d just missed each other, but he didn’t feel any other magics here.

“I’m sure he’s fine,” Suga said kindly, smiling down at Kenma. Kenma didn’t bother smiling back, but he inclined his head, grateful anyway. “We’ll lead the way for a bit,” Suga added and looped his arm through Daichi’s, tugging him along. “I can play tour guide, too, you know!”

“I thought you said everything looked weird here—”

“All the more exciting to share it with you!”

Shouyou laughed as the other pair pulled on ahead, and Kenma even smiled. It _was_ funny to see someone who was even more off-kilter than he felt. They weren’t bad, probably, and they were learning to keep their distance. Kenma liked their company.

Probably.

“So, this friend of yours,” Shouyou prompted.

“Kuro.”

“He’s another cat spirit?”

“Yeah. We grew up together.”

“Can he do magic, too?” Shouyou asked excitedly.

“Ah, yeah. He can do fire magic, though…” Kenma indulgently raised his hand, electricity sparking over his fingertips, and Shouyou made a sound he had difficulty identifying. “You really don’t know what kind of magics you can do?”

“Ehh, kind of?” Shouyou rubbed the back of his head, upsetting his unruly curls further, nose scrunched up in thought. “Once in awhile, I’ll do something kind of weird, but I can never do it again. Ukai and Suga and Kageyama have tried to teach me different kinds, but it never really works.”

“Kageyama?” Kenma repeated. He didn’t know that one.

“Yeah! He’s this guy—he works with Ukai too, sometimes, and he can turn into a _crow_! He can fly, it’s sooo unfair!”

Kenma didn’t see the appeal of flying; he’d gotten stuck in a very high tree once as a kitten, and heights definitely weren’t all they were cracked up to be. “Okay… You want to fly?”

“Yes! And Kageyama _can_ , and even when I _do_ get wind magic to listen to me, I usually end up hitting the ceiling or falling on my face or something that is _definitely_ not flying.” Shouyou crossed his arms, tight, across his chest.

Kenma quickly changed the subject. “So you work with a lot of magical beings…?”

“Yeah, at Ukai’s.”

It took more talking before Shouyou’s posture slowly relaxed again, and Kenma was content to let Shim steer the conversation after that, provided he didn’t bring up that Kageyama person again. Whoever he was, he certainly frustrated Shouyou, and Kenma vastly preferred the excited, partially one-sided chatter about forests or magic or warm spots to nap in the sun.

With as much travel as they’d been doing, he shouldn’t have been surprised to get into territory he didn’t recognize. But they pulled up short at a crossroads Kenma had never seen before. Suga, fists planted on his hips, looked back and forth at the two branching paths with his wings buzzing in irritation. (Daichi stared like he’d abruptly grown a second head.)

“We’re going to have to just pick one, if we don’t have any other clues,” Daichi said, eyes still on the translucent wings. Suga craned his neck back to look at Kenma.

“Do you know which way Kuroo might have gone? I don’t know how to track a cat.”

“I don’t know,” Kenma replied. Kuroo still felt so, so far away, connection faint between them. Wherever he was, he was definitely _lost_ , and they were going to go into wilder places that Kenma couldn’t help them in. Anxiety prickled at the base of his spine and made his tail snap from side to side behind him.

“What’s that?” Shouyou asked, pointing down the right path.

The other three look down the path, but Kenma, for his part, didn’t know what Shouyou is pointing at.

“Can we ask the bird for help?” Shouyou continued hopefully.

“What bird…?” Suga replied.

Shouyou went down the path, just a little, and Kenma followed him, blinking in surprise when he saw not a person or even a bird in a branch, but a little cage hanging from one of the higher branches. He had no idea how Shouyou had even seen it.

Shouyou was already halfway up the tree to fetch it by the time Suga had even gotten a “Be careful” out of his mouth.

The bird tweeted and whistled and flapped its wings, frantic, as Shouyou shook the branch it was hanging from. Kenma peered up at it, eyes narrowed, ears pricked—it sounded like a songbird, one of the pretty ones that Nekomata sometimes spoke with, but it definitely didn’t _look_ like one. In fact, despite its size (it was small, but the cage was far too small for it in turn, and every beat of its wings smacked against the bars) it actually looked a bit like an owl.

“I don’t think that’s a—” Kenma began just as Shouyou managed to unhook the cage from the branch.

The branch cracked; Shouyou dropped it, clinging to the tree with a whine, and Kenma caught it neatly in his hands. A moment later, Suga caught Shouyou as both he and the branch came down. “Careful!” Suga scolded without any heat. “Your friend is a _cat_ spirit, you know. And I can fly. Think before diving headfirst into things.”

“And who knows what that thing is,” Daichi added with a nod toward the small cage.

Kenma looked down at the thing in his hands; the tiny owl looked back up at him with eyes so big Kenma actually thought it was _pleading_. It looked an awful lot like when Kuroo wanted the last fish. It twittered again, musical and light, and definitely not at all like the hooting it _should_ be doing.

“What is it?” Shouyou and Suga asked in unison.

“I think it’s trapped,” Kenma replied. The cage thrummed with magic, and despite himself, he _did_ feel bad for the bird. It wasn’t difficult to stick a claw in the little lock; the only really tricky part was getting it to listen to him and actually open.

It popped open before he could think of making it promise not to eat them, but he figured his chances were good in a fight. The cage clattered to the ground and the owl popped out, chirps immediately transforming into hoarse hooting, and the bird exclaimed, “Thank every star in the sky! That was _soooo_ crowded!”

When it landed on the ground on one foot, the owl immediately spun to face them. It spread both its small wings, completely, and offered a relieved groan. The owl then bowed, wings still outstretched—and when it straightened, it was a bird no longer.

Kenma reeled back from the large _man_ that was suddenly before them, arms _and_ wings extended as he straightened. He wasn’t wearing much clothing, bare-chested and with a few raggedy scraps of an open robe tied around his waist. The feathers on his wings matched those of the owl, and his hair was streaked in the same manner as well, but his skin was tanned dark and his eyes were of an even more piercing gold than Kuroo’s.

“Thanks for breaking me out of that cage!” the man said with a grin to rival Sugawara’s.

The tension, thick in the group who had just found a physically imposing intruder in their midst, was almost instantly broken when Shouyou bounded up and tugged on the stranger’s wing. “These are _so big_! Are you an owl shifter?”

Suga chuckled nervously as he tugged Shouyou away and behind him. Kenma willed both his fur to lower and the heat in his cheeks to leave.

 

—

 

Bokuto looked down at the swiftly-disappearing orange-haired shortie and puffed out his chest. “I am!” he said. “Well, I’m a peri, but sometimes I’m an owl and sometimes I’m like this! Tada!”

He flexed his wings, looking down at the cat who’d freed him, intrigued by the pink cheeks he glimpsed before the man ducked his head. Wanting to get a better look at his savior, Bokuto dropped to one knee.

“You saved me,” Bokuto said, eyes widening as he met the other’s golden gaze. Oh, he was cute. Nevermind that random attraction was part of why Bokuto had been captured in the first place—he couldn’t just ignore this adorable person in front of him. “Do you know what that means? It means you get three wishes! Or, ah, well, it means I’ll do three major things for you. Whatever you want. Whatever your little heart desires.”

Sure, he was laying it on thick, but from the way the man’s cheeks were heating up, it was possible he was just as interested as Bokuto found himself to be.

“In that case, get dressed,” the blond said, looking to the side.

Bokuto gaped at him, then glanced up at the grey-haired man who had been moving forward to place himself between Bokuto and his savior. The redhead behind him was giggling, and it looked like the dark-haired man was trying to hide a smile.

Pursing his lips, the grey-haired man said, “Well, you could always ask him if he’s seen Kuroo.”

“Ah, good point,” the blond said.

“Kuroo?” Bokuto asked, the shock of rejection still running through him. His knee was beginning to hurt as well. He looked down at himself, noting the fact that his clothing had been left in tatters. Get dressed. Yes, he probably did need to get dressed.

“My friend. He’s a black cat. He’s missing.”

“Oh,” Bokuto said, tugging at the scraps of his robe and murmuring encouragement for the edges to knit themselves back together. “Cat, cat… Oh wait. I think I do remember a cat.”

He didn’t miss the hope in the blond’s eyes as they shot him a look. It caught at something inside him. He’d been totally putting him on about the three wishes thing, but a part of Bokuto wanted to give this kid the world. But he didn’t have the world. He only had his story, so he gave them that.

“It wasn’t too long ago… a few hours, maybe? Time gets fuzzy when you’re stuck in a trap. I was just wandering the woods here when I heard the most beautiful sound I’d ever heard. It was a song with tones so sweet, I just had to find the source of it. And then I came around the corner and saw him in the tree. He had curly dark hair, and pale flawless skin, and I’m sure his eyes were incredible too but they were closed. But his mouth was open and he was singing those incredible notes, claws curved around the branch he was sitting on, arms strumming an elegant lute, black wings fluttering behind him. I saw him and I just had to talk to him, you know? He was _so_ beautiful,” Bokuto murmured, fingers smoothing over the newly-patched silk of his robe, tugging it together over his chest. Glancing down he flushed a bit, noting the unimpressed look in the blond’s golden eyes. “Only maybe the most beautiful person I’ve seen, I mean, compared to ah…”

“Focus,” the blond said, eyes narrowing. “Kuro.”

“Oh yeah. Ok, so I sang out a greeting to him and he just took one look at me and flew away. Obviously he was just shy. And he wanted me to follow him, right? But just then a wind kicked up and I couldn’t get into the air, so I just ran after him. He was fast! But I’m fast too. One of the fastest peri alive,” he said, puffing up with pride again. The redhead was looking spellbound by the story, and that just made Bokuto smile widely.

“Fastest?” the dark-haired man asked.

“Well, fourth-fastest,” Bokuto admitted. “But still! That’s pretty fast.”

“Kuro,” the blond said again, beginning to sound impatient.

“Oh yeah. So, I was running along, and I’d almost caught up to the man when this black cat came out of nowhere and bowled me over! He didn’t even say sorry! He was running the same way as—um—well I don’t know the beautiful man’s name, but it’s got to be beautiful too, right?”

“Right,” the grey-haired man said dryly.

“Yeah,” Bokuto murmured, looking down at his hands. “And well, I lost my balance when the cat ran into me, and accidentally got hauled up in this trap that the daevas set out, so the last I saw of your friend he was running away. After that, I tried to get free, but it wasn’t any use. One of the daevas came by and yelled at me for ruining their trap, and then they decided to cage me and put me up in the tree to suffer until they could figure out what to do with me. But now you set me free! You saved me!”

Shaking his head, the blond motioned to the redhead. “Shouyou saved you, really. Without him you’d still be stuck up in that tree.”

“Shouyou?” Bokuto asked.

“But Kenma, you were the one who picked the lock.”

Kenma. His name was Kenma, and the face he made at Hinata’s statement was absolutely priceless.

The gray-haired man chuckled uneasily. “Ok then, well. Thanks for the story, but we have to be going, I think. Have to find our friend and all…”

“I’m coming with you,” Bokuto said, nodding decisively.

“What?”

“I’m coming with you. I still owe Kenma three wishes. Can I call you Kenma? I could call you um, master, if you’d prefer.”

The red flush that covered Kenma’s cheeks at that was incredibly adorable. “Kenma’s fine,” he muttered, hiding his face behind a curtain of blond and black hair. “And you don’t owe me three wishes. You did get dressed, after all.”

“And you did tell us the story,” the gray-haired man said, sounding doubtful.

“Oh, but what’s a story between friends,” Bokuto said, throwing an arm around the grey-haired man and giving him a big grin. “I’m Bokuto.”

The grey-haired man pulled back, making a face of his own as he said, “You told us.”

“And you are?”

“At the moment? Annoyed.”

Bokuto wanted to laugh, but he managed to keep a straight face as he said, “Hello annoyed, nice to meet you.”

That earned him an impressive punch to the gut. He doubled over, wincing a bit and glancing up to find the dark-haired man laughing as he patted the gray-haired man’s back. “I’m Daichi,” the dark-haired man said, grinning from ear to ear, “and this is Suga.”

“Sugawara,” Suga retorted, still looking annoyed.

Lifting a hand, Bokuto grinned, trying to straighten up from the pain in his gut. “Nice to meet you, Daichi, Suga. You likewise, Shouyou. And Kenma. I look forward to traveling with you.

Kenma huffed and turned away, marching down the road with his tail swinging behind him.

“Ah,” Bokuto said with a grin, “they actually went that way.”

Kenma stopped, head slowly turning to give Bokuto a chillingly intense look. It made Bokuto’s heart clinch. There was something about Kenma that was just adorable and scary and beautiful all mixed into one. He wasn’t large at all, but he reeked of suppressed power, and Bokuto wanted to get to know the mind locked away behind those golden eyes.

“Fine,” Kenma muttered, coming back and going down the other road, the others starting to follow.

“So do you fly a lot with those wings?” Shouyou asked, brown eyes wide as he looked up at him. “They’re bigger than Kageyama’s, for sure!”

“Kageyama?” Bokuto asked, falling into step with the others.

“Oh, a guy I know back home. Ah, and most people call me Hinata.”

“Hinata,” Bokuto said, nodding. He looked more closely at the man, trying to figure him out. Kenma was obviously some sort of cat fae, and Suga was a pixie, Daichi he wasn’t sure about, but there was something about Hinata that puzzled him.

“Do you know what I am?” Hinata asked, frowning.

“Is that a trick question?”

“No, it’s just—you’re looking at me really intently, so I thought that—well—maybe—”

Bokuto gasped. “You don’t know what you are?”

Looking morose, Hinata shook his head. “Nope,” he said, brightening like someone had flicked a switch. “But Nekomata said that I’d find out on this journey! Probably. That’s why I thought—well, peri are supposed to be really strong magical creatures, right? So I thought you might know.”

“We _are_ strong magical creatures! But, uh. You feel familiar to me, but I can’t quite place it.”

“Oh, well that’s ok,” Hinata said, glancing forward as Kenma looked back and huffed. “Oh, well it’ll be fun to travel with you, Bokuto! Glad you aren’t stuck in a cage!”

“Me too kid,” Bokuto said, watching the redhead run up to walk next to Kenma. Kenma looked back again, tail twitching as he caught Bokuto’s gaze on him. He was too cute.

“Well, I guess we’re stuck with you,” Suga said.

He looked more amused than annoyed now though, lips quirking in a face that was pretty enough to normally distract Bokuto from watching where he was going. Normally, but not now.

He glanced back at the black and gold tail swinging to and fro in front of them, and smiled. “Yep,” he said, “you’re stuck with me.”

This was going to be fun.

 

—

 

Suga laughed behind his hand as he watched Bokuto, for the third time in as many minutes, almost trip over his feet as he watched Kenma’s swaying tail. It was a bit like a metronome, a mild counterpoint to his steps, and Suga had long since gotten used to the movement himself. Even Daichi had stopped staring at the cat tail and ears by the time they’d made it to the fairy realm.

“He’s mooning over him,” Suga confided, grinning with his hand to hide himself. “I think he has a crush on Kenma for saving him.”

“Shouldn’t he like Hinata, too?” Daichi asked.

“Well, they seem to get along, too, but just… watch.”

“I’ve _been_ watching,” Daichi replied. Suga liked Daichi (okay, a lot), but he thought he could be a little dense at times. “Is this how fairies court people? Follow them and make eyes? And curse them?”

“That’s rude,” Suga pouted.

“It’s true, and strange,” Daichi maintained, straight-faced, until he cracked a little smile of his own. “And weirdly endearing. Should we be on the lookout for Bokuto potentially cursing Kenma?”

Suga smacked him on the shoulder. “I’m _going_ to fix that!”

Ahead of them, Bokuto tucked a flower behind Kenma’s ear, having to try several times due to the twitching and shape of it; even Hinata looked a little sly at the way Kenma’s face slowly heated up.

But immediately after he got the flower to stay, Bokuto fell back into step on Daichi’s other side, leaving Kenma and Hinata to lead the way. The cat spirit stuck pointedly close to Hinata, but he didn’t throw the flower away.

“So, human, huh?” Bokuto asked without preamble. Daichi nodded, eyebrow raised. “Humans are cool!”

“I… guess,” Daichi slowly replied. “I’ve never met a peri before.”

“I don’t think we get out to the human world too often anymore! Not that I’m old enough to remember it, but you know, you hear all kinds of stories, right?”

“So you both have only heard of each other,” Suga translated, amused. Bokuto nods, not missing a beat, bright eyes still on Daichi.

“What’s it like to be a human? How do you stay balanced without wings?”

Suga’s wings fluttered, too, and he can’t help the curious incline of his head, either. Daichi shrugged, then realized a moment later that neither would be satisfied with just that. “If you never have them, then you’re not used to walking with them. How do you live _with_ wings? Doesn’t it get uncomfortable, never sleeping on your back?”

“Humans sleep on their backs?” Bokuto shot back, laughing. His wings rustled, and the size of them meant that one pinion flicked against Suga’s thigh.

As he twisted to brush it back, Suga caught sight of something behind them, just off the path.

He froze, and on reflex, reached over to grab part of Daichi’s sleeve to stop him, too. Bokuto stopped just a step ahead of them with a curious noise.

It was a pair of foxes, the larger one cream and brown, the smaller one almost completely black. Both of them had several tails, and the smaller one jolted when it registered that they were noticed.

“Hey! Guys, wait up a moment!” Bokuto called, and when his voice rang out, the foxes jumped and disappeared into wisps of smoke and leaves. “There’s—wait, where did they go?”

“Where did what go?” Hinata asked as he and Kenma jogged back toward them.

“I have the feeling we may be near someone’s territory or home,” Suga replied. He glanced at the forest around them again—the trees themselves hadn’t changed, though they might have been thicker in this area, and perhaps a little greener—but didn’t see any more beady eyes or multiple tails. “Kenma, do you know anything about any fox spirits?”

“I don’t really know this area,” he replied tonelessly.

“Fox fae are tricky,” Bokuto lamented. He rubbed his chin, wings rustling behind him (nearly smacking Suga again), then brightened with a sharp-toothed grin. “I think there’s a shrine near here, though! They could be guardian spirits!”

“We would only have to pay respects to stay safe as we travel through here, then,” Kenma added.

“Or we end up tricked by a bunch of foxes,” Hinata said.

“Okay, back up and humor me for a moment. Are fox spirits anything like human myths say they are? Tricksters, shapeshifters, that kind of thing?”

“Usually,” Bokuto and Kenma replied in accidental unison. Kenma quickly looked away with a pout. Bokuto continued, “But they can be nice, too! We just have to make sure not to offend them.”

“So we find their shrine and pay respects? Do we need something as a gift?” Suga asked. Maybe a little bit of pixie dust could work in a pinch, but he had the feeling that fae wouldn’t be too impressed. Maybe they could get lucky and they’d like a gift of magic, since they certainly had enough variety between them.

He wondered if they would have seen Kuroo anywhere, or if they’d know anything about curses. Kitsune were supposed to be able to curse others, so it wasn’t a longshot, and Suga’s hand tightened where he hadn’t released Daichi’s shirt.

“How do we find them? On the path?” Hinata asked with a glance back over his shoulder at the path in question.

“Halt, intruders!”

The group turned, once again, but didn’t find a fox: they found a _squirrel_ sitting upright off the path, tail twitching, baring its teeth.

“We aren’t allowing—”

“Don’t go running off!”

Without further warning, the squirrel was bowled over by the same large gold and brown fox from before, and they went tumbling. The fox ended up on top, crouched over the squirrel, and when it bared its teeth it struck a far more imposing figure than the tinier spirit beneath it.

The black fox darted underneath and grabbed up the squirrel. When it popped back out on the other side, it was a boy with dark hair to match his dark ears, and still the two fox tails behind him, beneath his long, loose shirt. He shot them a wary look before he ran off, protesting squirrel tight in his hands.

The other fox turned in a blink, now a man with his sleeves rolled up to his shoulders, arms crossed tight across his chest, and five tails lashing behind him. Imposing size aside, Suga knew he was older and stronger than the other two, and definitely not someone to piss off. So he beamed at him, and before he could bark orders, Suga told him, “We didn’t mean to intrude! We were actually hoping to pay respects at your shrine and move safely through your lands.”

“We heard you,” the fox spirit snapped. His eyes lingered first on Suga, then Bokuto, then Kenma. He seemed to dismiss Daichi and Hinata altogether. “And no. No one’s allowed through right now.”

“Aren’t foxes supposed to eat squirrels?” Bokuto asked, and even when Suga smacked him, it couldn’t take back his words. The fox spirit’s eyes narrowed further.

“He’s one of us. You’re not. So go away.”

“We’re looking for someone,” Hinata piped up, then tugged on Kenma’s hand until he was dragged out front in center. “A cat fae, like him! Except black, and bigger. Have you seen him?”

“Cats are pretty far from home,” the fox loftily replied.

“He got lost. We’re trying to bring him home,” Suga answered for Kenma. “That’s all. We’ll leave you and your friends alone.” _So much for getting to ask about curses_ , he privately lamented.

“ _Kamasaki_!” _Another_ kitsune ran up, jumped immediately into a more human form, and bowed deeply at the waist. “I am _so sorry_ for him, we didn’t mean to be rude to travelers!”

This spirit was smaller than Kamasaki, but had eight tails; Suga wasn’t actually sure what to make of him, especially when he raised his face and seemed surprisingly earnest.

“You said something about a lost person?” the newcomer asked, cutting across Kamasaki’s embarrassed spluttering and Bokuto and Hinata’s curious noises.

 

—

 

Moniwa was the leader of the fox spirits in this part of the forest. It was firmly their territory (as repeated, emphatically, by Kamasaki) and they were guardians of several shrines. Most of them lived near the Iron Shrine, the largest and best-kept in their lands, and most of them were kitsune.

Most.

Kenma got tired just _watching_ Shouyou and the squirrel spirit. In some not-funny twist of fate, Koganegawa was _large_ for a squirrel, bigger than Sugawara or Bokuto or maybe even Kuroo. Kenma thought his tail was probably about the size of Shouyou. But they bounced around each other like they were long lost friends, eons old, instead of having met properly about ten minutes ago.

“Jealous?” Bokuto asked, leaning too far into his space, and Kenma leaned back away from him with a pout. “You’ve been watchin’ them since we got here. Have you even noticed the kitsune glaring daggers at you?”

“Of course I have. And they’re mostly watching _you_.”

“We haven’t seen any cats out here for a long time,” Moniwa explained, equal parts pleasant and embarrassed for the way two of the bigger kitsune continued glaring at them from over each of his shoulders. “Not even this friend of yours, sorry.”

“But you have squirrels?” Daichi asked, and Suga laughed despite the rudeness. He seemed to be in better spirits since finding out they weren’t going to get barred from the land.

“Koganegawa is one of us,” Kamasaki said with an even fiercer glower. The silent kitsune on his other side nodded firmly.

“He’s been formally adopted by the fox fae of this area,” Moniwa explained. He seemed very used to explaining on behalf of the others. “So, yes, he is one of us. We, um, actually think he might think he’s a kitsune, too, sometimes…”

“That’s adorable,” Suga said.

Moniwa relaxed with his own little smile. “He’s a good kid, just excitable, especially when it comes to defending our parts of the forest. And right now, that’s kind of a problem…”

“Why’s it a problem?” Bokuto asked with a tilt of his head.

“You said someone you knew was missing?” Moniwa asked in return.

Kenma was glad they didn’t drag him back to explain what had happened—not much _had_ happened, they just got lost, after all, and now he couldn’t find Kuroo no matter how hard he was trying—and Sugawara explained their journey so far with a little help from Bokuto about running into Kuroo and that so-beautiful kinnara, also slipping in the cursed bit as tactfully as he could. Daichi looked a little uncomfortable with the sudden attention, but at least they had dropped the glaring to do so.

“I don’t think we can help with this kind of curse,” Kamasaki admitted as he prodded at Daichi’s shoulder. “We’ve never really dealt with a lot of humans here. Or fairy curses, for that matter.”

“But you know who _did_ know more about curses?” Moniwa sighed. He pulled the foxes back away from the uncomfortable human, and informed them, “One of our own went missing recently, too. We haven’t been able to find him.”

“He liked cursing people, so maybe he’d know how to break yours,” Kamasaki muttered.

“He was my second in command here, and as you can see, we have our arms full trying to keep the area safe and our kits in line, so we haven’t been able to go out looking. His name is Futakuchi, and he’s a red fox with four tails, and—”

“And he’s the most aggravating, infuriating, smug asshole you’ll ever meet!” Kamasaki burst out.

Moniwa spared him a particularly flat look. “We’re worried he went and pissed off something big.”

“Seems like something he’d do,” the tallest kitsune grunted, making both Sugawara and Daichi jump. Kenma had half-thought he’d been mute.

“That’s a lot of people missing,” Suga murmured. Kenma, ears pricked, still heard him, despite the way that he was angling the remark to Daichi. “We’ll keep an eye out for this friend of yours.”

“Thank you!” Moniwa exclaimed with a happy wag of all of his tails. He seemed years younger, round-faced and bright-eyed and almost puppyish, despite how old he must have been. “If you find him, please drag him back here for us. You can have safe passage through our forest, and maybe Futakuchi will know of some way to lift your curse.”

“Thank you for all your help!” Bokuto replied, just as cheery.

With many waves and the trees around them filled with gratitude, they left the Iron Shrine, Shouyou going as far as walking backwards to continue frantically waving his arms at his new friend (who looked as if he sorely wanted to join them). They’d been given directions and a bit of food to keep them going, even if Kenma was beginning to get tired of the long days of travel.

But Kuroo was worth it. And he was beginning to feel a little bad for Daichi; he seemed very, _very_ lost in that realm.

“So, if we keep going this way, then we’re going to meet…”

“The Seijoh Grove,” Kenma finished, nose wrinkled. He may not have been familiar with this part of the realm, but he’d _heard_ of that one, at least. It was supposed to be bountiful and green year-round, and filled with all kinds of nasty guardians. Guardian kitsune were one thing, but they just kept to the shrines, mostly.

“How bad can plant spirits be?” Daichi asked.

Bokuto burst out laughing, actually holding his sides, wings flaring to keep his balance as he bent over. Kenma rather liked the sound. “Y-You’ve never met one, have you!”

“I’m sure it’ll be fine,” Suga said with a sympathetic clap on Daichi’s shoulder. Bokuto continued cackling.

 

—

 

The path eventually came to run alongside a small, babbling brook. The trees had changed again, bigger and sturdier and impossibly greener, and the dappled sunlight that reached them played off of the gold in Shouyou’s hair and the silver in Bokuto and Sugawara’s.

Kenma, finding himself alongside Daichi while Bokuto and Suga showed off with small feats of water magic, sighed at how picturesque it all was. It was a very pretty part of the forest. It didn’t really bring him closer to finding Kuroo, yet, or even helping the human beside him.

Not that Daichi seemed to mind, right now. His eyes were bright and entire being engaged by how Suga arced water over his head with a flourish—the impressiveness ended a moment later when Bokuto elbowed him and they both ended up dripping. “Not fair!” Suga whined and splashed him again for good measure.

“If you just admitted I was better at magic,” Bokuto huffed back.

Shouyou, still dry and trying to mimic them with his own little bubble of water, beamed when he managed to get it to move how he wanted.

It popped a moment later.

He was still grinning, at least, but Kenma saw the disappointment as easily as if he’d screamed it.

“They’re something,” Daichi commented, casually.

“I guess.” He thought Sugawara and Daichi were cute enough, but Kenma didn’t particularly want to hear about it firsthand right now.

“I’m still getting used to the magic stuff,” Daichi admitted, rubbing the back of his head, “so maybe I’m easily impressed.”

“No, they’re pretty good.”

Shouyou and Bokuto both made awed sounds as Sugawara flicked his wrist and created a rainbow from a fine mist over their heads. Daichi’s expression sort of matched theirs, too, but Kenma thought it kinder not to mention it. “Can this sort of stuff be done in the human world, too?”

“Usually. Not as easily.” Shouyou and Suga had lived there, so they were probably used to it. Kenma still thought the feeling of magic there felt a little off. Oh well, he didn’t have to return there.

…But Shouyou lived there.

Kenma pushed the thought back down.

Bokuto suddenly froze, wings flared, his magicked water splashing down between his feet. A moment later, Sugawara shoved Shouyou behind him, and all three of them scrambled back out of the water. Daichi started forward, but Kenma made it to them first, and found them backing away from a pair of strange men. Both were dressed in greens and browns, in loose clothes that showed off their intimidating physiques, and even if they weren’t as large as Bokuto, their scowls were more than enough to make anyone balk.

The taller of the two stepped forward, hands held up in a gesture of peace. “Sorry, didn’t mean to startle you.” Just like that, the scowl was gone. Mostly. “We haven’t gotten a lot of travelers lately, and. Uh.”

The other one had not dropped his scowl, and if anything, frowned harder. His bright blond hair and crown of leaves and flowers did little to make him look friendlier.  

Kenma got the feeling these two weren’t the usual welcoming committee.

The taller one ran a hand back through his black, spiky hair, nearly upsetting his own crooked wreath, and tried again after a deep breath. “Uh, so, welcome to the sacred green lands of Seijoh.”

“You don’t gotta say the speech,” the other one said, voice even lower than Kenma anticipated. It sounded a lot like a growl. He was starting to wonder if this wasn’t some sort of dog spirit in disguise.

“We didn’t mean to intrude or anything,” Bokuto told them. “I mean, we knew we were headed in this direction, but we didn’t want to piss anyone off! We just wanted to make camp somewhere and sleep and maybe get something to eat?”

“If that’s not any trouble,” Sugawara quickly added.

The dark-haired man sighed again. “Nah, it’s no trouble. We usually don’t find anyone this far out, and like I said, our friendly one is missing.”

“Is that what he is.”

“Do you mean Oikawa?” Bokuto asked. Both of the forest fae stared at him, surprised then suspicious. Bokuto’s wings fluffed up as he shuffled back, a defensive hunch to his shoulders. “I met him once or twice. He lived around here, right?”

“Yeah. He likes to travel, and he likes to wander, so he’s usually the one who guides any strangers back to our home so they can rest there. He has a way with people—”

“No he doesn’t,” the blond one deadpanned.

Without looking, the other cuffed him upside the head. “—but he’s not here, right now. C’mon, it’s this way. Just because that asshole’s gone doesn’t mean we can’t show some proper hospitality.”

 They both grabbed big bubbles of water to haul back with them, unstable and sloshing with every step until Suga intervened and offered to help. (He shot Daichi an incredulous look over his shoulder, but Daichi just as wildly shrugged back.) Kenma wasn’t too sure about following them, even if it meant a proper place to sleep _and_ food—the blond one, introduced as Kyoutani, still glared daggers at them and the nicer one, Iwaizumi, could do little to stop him.

Shouyou grabbed Kenma’s hand as they picked through underbrush. The pair leading them walked through the forest like it bowed out of the way for them; the rest of them struggled through bushes and roots and low branches. Suga’s wings buzzed as he hopped over a few obstacles, and Bokuto tried to do the same, but the trees were too close to properly fly. He folded his wings again with a whine.

At least the noise drew the attention of their leaders again.

“Oh, sorry,” Iwaizumi grunted, noticing Daichi tangled in a particularly thorny bush. “Hold this.”

He shoved his bubble of water at Bokuto, and Kyoutani wordlessly pushed his onto Suga before he grabbed Iwaizumi’s hand. They gestured in unison, swinging their free hands up with a glowing arc, and the foliage parted around them, creating a natural path that seemed like it’d been there ages instead of moments.  

Most of the water splashed out when Bokuto crowed in delight. (Shouyou also made the same sound, so Kenma got to experience the off-key screech in stereo, but Shouyou also hadn’t been holding onto someone’s magic.)

“You’re easily impressed, aren’t you?” Iwaizumi asked, mouth twitching like he was trying to stop from smiling, cutting across Kyoutani’s annoyed growl. “Aren’t you fae, too?”

“I’m not so good with plant magic, usually,” Bokuto admitted. He and Kenma both glanced at the sudden and sharp slump of Shouyou’s shoulders. “B-But what’s wrong with liking cool magic, huh?! What else can plant fairies do?”

“We’re not fairies,” Kyoutani snapped.

“We just take care of the forest here,” Iwaizumi sheepishly said. “That’s all.”

Sugawara hummed thoughtfully, and Kenma’s hand tightened on Shouyou’s. Not that he was complaining, but the spirits they had run into so far actually seemed pretty nice. Definitely friendly. Whenever travelers showed up in cat lands, Nekomata usually dealt with them, or sometimes delegated things to the older cats. Kenma had never had to be part of a welcome group, but Kuroo had, a couple times.

Kenma didn’t really think he’d do any better if he’d gotten suddenly swapped out. People like Shouyou or Kuroo or maybe this Oikawa were better suited to dealing with strangers. Maybe Sugawara, if he wasn’t prone to accidentally cursing others.

“You seem deep in thought,” Bokuto said. He bent down into Kenma’s space, almost eye-level with him. Kuroo did the same thing. Kenma found he didn’t mind it when either of them did it, but he _did_ mind the way Shouyou waggled his eyebrows at the way Kenma didn’t shy away from him. “Have you been here before?”

“No, Kuro and I never traveled this far.”

“It’s not a bad area, I think, but there are cooler places. We could visit them after we track down everyone!” Bokuto eagerly suggested.

Kenma’s ears folded, not annoyed with the invitation but somewhat unsure of how he felt about not only further travel, but a trip somewhere with _Bokuto_. His stomach flipped, just a little.

“I’m sure someone _somewhere_ will know what you are,” Bokuto added.

Kenma’s cheeks went pink. _Of course it was for everyone_. Bokuto was friendly. _Really_ friendly. He was already chatty with Shouyou, as well as Daichi and Suga, and probably these forest guardians too. His ears went flatter against his hair and his tail swished so hard he accidentally swatted Shouyou with it.

Shouyou squeezed his hand, and Kenma gratefully squeezed back, just a little.

‘Home’ for the Seijoh Grove was a large clearing ringing the _biggest_ tree Kenma had ever seen. He hadn’t even known any trees this large existed in this forest, much less so well-hidden, or so friendly. Leaves probably the size of each of them filtered out what remained of the setting sun, making everything soft and orange, and many more spirits darted too and fro from the other, smaller trees, paying little mind to the newcomers. For once, Kenma didn’t feel eyes on him, despite the activity in the clearing.

“Gwaaah!”

“Bwoooah!”

“Are you trying to communicate with it?” Suga asked, grinning, and Iwaizumi hid his own smile in his fist with a cough. “Be polite.”

“You’ve already been a help, and we don’t turn away strangers here.” He took the water back from Suga, and almost immediately, another man came marching over, tall and slim and missing any plants on his light hair. “Yahaba, here’s your—”

“This isn’t enough to restart the spring,” Yahaba snapped. Despite the roughness of his magic as he grabbed the bubble, not a single drop spilled. He didn’t even seem to be paying attention to it. “It’s still dry, Iwaizumi.”

“I know, I know,” he sighed, scrubbing a hand through his hair, upsetting his own leafy crown. “Excuse me. Kyoutani, show them around and get them food.”

Kyoutani looked about as pleased at this duty as Kenma felt. He glanced at their party of travelers like he might spit on them, and Bokuto sneered right back, unrepentant.  

“Behave,” Iwaizumi tossed back over his shoulder as he jogged after the departing Yahaba.

Kenma was about to whisper at Shouyou, maybe a bad try at a joke but probably just wondering if they could find a quiet place away from the bustle of the grove or maybe have a proper introduction to that nice big tree, but he was startled to find Shouyou staring _hard_ at Yahaba’s retreating back. “Is everything okay?” is what he settled on asking.

“Huh? Yeah! Man, I’m starving!” Shouyou poorly covered, and tugged Kenma along after the direction Kyoutani started walking in.

“Me too!” Bokuto immediately agreed.

“Me three,” Suga joined in. Daichi sheepishly nodded, too.

“We’ll feed you,” Kyoutani grunted.

“Look at this eclectic bunch!”

“What a darling collection.”

“I thought you two left already to look for the asshole,” Kyoutani complained as two other fae swooped down from branches above to throw their arms over each of his shoulders. They were both far taller than he was, and looked significantly less irritated (though one looked pretty sleepy, so that was little improvement).

“Hanamaki,” the pink-haired one offered, cocking his head to rub against Kyoutani’s. “And this is Matsukawa. When Oikawa’s away, we’re in charge. Probably. What brings you to take advantage of our hospitality this time of year? And with such a group?”

“ _And_ with a human tourist,” the other, Matsukawa, added with a leer toward Daichi.

“Iwaizumi told me to take care of them—” Kyoutani started, but he was quickly shushed with a pair of hands on his mouth. It looked like he bit one of them, but they didn’t seem to mind, or were used to it.

“We’ll take over. We’re plenty friendly.”

“We also had food duty today, so we can handle meal time.”

“It’s nice to meet you,” Suga brightly said, grinning at them both, and they smiled back with far less innocence. Kyoutani slunk off with another poorly concealed grumble, and Kenma would have worried about the new pair, had they not immediately latched onto Sugawara and Daichi and pestered them with a million and a half questions. A cat spirit, a peri, and Shouyou seemed to come secondary.

Kenma found it easy to slip off after he got some food. He didn’t slip off alone, though, since Shouyou seemed miffed at being dismissed (again), and Bokuto stuck close to both of them after making sure there would be enough food to make him happy. There was; if nothing else, the Seijoh Grove guardians were exceptionally gracious hosts.

Kenma rolled an apple around between his palms, watching the others through the curtain of his hair. Sugawara kept an eye on Daichi and how much food he was eating, and not all that subtly. Kenma trusted Nekomata’s magic, but he wondered how long anyone could stay here if they weren’t magic.

He spotted Yahaba again across the clearing, sitting on the rocky edge of what must have been the dry spring he was so worried about. Shouyou was staring at him again.

“We’re fine, you know. No need to worry a bunch of strange strangers.”

Shouyou squeaked and Kenma startled as Hanamaki plopped down between them, practically in Bokuto’s lap. The peri blinked down at him, cheeks stuffed too full of fruit to say anything.

“Yahaba just worried about our water, and with Oikawa off prancing around wherever, he’s feeling a lot of pressure. Don’t think he’s always this snippy,” Hanamaki informed them.

“Wheh iff Oikwah?” Bokuto asked. Hanamaki and Shouyou both laughed, and even Kenma smiled a little. Bokuto swallowed, sheepishly chuckles, and repeated, “Where is Oikawa? I thought he was always really, really proud of this place.”

“He wanders. This time I guess he just got a little… lost,” Hanamaki replied with a shrug that didn’t really fool Kenma.

“I’m sensin’ a pattern here,” Bokuto hummed with a sideways glance at Kenma for confirmation. He nodded. “The fox spirits are missing someone too, and so are the cats—a black cat named Kuroo—and then a really pretty bird fae? I mean, if everyone else is missing, he probably is too, and maybe Oikawa, too.”

“You’re probably right. We just haven’t been advertising that little fact.” Hanamaki sighed, flicked a grape at Matsukawa, and popped another in his mouth. “You guys are the ragtag search party then, huh?”

“I guess so?” Shouyou replied, but he was undeniably pleased. “People keep getting lost, or something, and we’re going to find them.”

“And what if they’re not all in the same place?”

“This is too many to be coincidence,” Kenma mumbled.

“Oh, so you _can_ talk,” Hanamaki replied mildly, eyebrow raised. Kenma ducked his head. “Okay, so we have a vested cat interest, you passed by the foxes on your way here, we have a bird interest here—where does that put you, shortie?” He turned then to Shouyou, brow still raised, but back to grinning in that crooked way that somehow didn’t seem too mean. Maybe just a little annoying. “You’re not an unfortunate cursed human, either, or the unfortunate curser. What are _you_?”

Shouyou slumped, _again_ , this time with a fierce scowl, and Kenma frowned. Bokuto swooped in with a hasty, “That’s what we’re going to figure out! There’s a lot going on in this adventure.”

Shouyou rubbed the back of his head, not looking quite as despondent as before. Just a little awkward. “With everyone who’s missing, that’s a lot of people to ask, right? And it’s not like I mind helping track everyone down, and we’ve seen a lot of cool things so far. It’s fun.”

“Fun is the most important goal of any ragtag search party journey,” Hanamaki advised, fake wise, and the way both Shouyou and Bokuto laughed stopped Kenma from wrinkling his nose _too_ much.

As it turned out, the leaves from their huge tree _are_ about the size of a person. Definitely bigger than Kenma and Shouyou, not quite Daichi sized. Shouyou made his usual awed noises, to Kenma’s amusement, though he didn’t find it quite so amusing when Bokuto tried to mimic him in a clear grab for attention.

Suga claimed a spot close to Daichi in what could only be called an _aggressive cuddle_ maneuver, and as Kenma rolled his eyes and sighed, Bokuto grabbed the edge of one of the nearer leaves and tried to mimic that, too. Kenma scooted a little closer to Shouyou, tail rustling the soft leaves beneath them that made up their borrowed beds. He ended up between them, not uncomfortably close to either. Bokuto put off enough heat to feel even from that distance, and Kenma wanted to curl toward it as drowsiness overtook him.

He missed cuddling with Kuroo on the cooler nights. The leaves were nice, but he was used to fur and warmth and sleeping in piles with the other cats. This journey had been _sorely_ lacking in that department, and he couldn’t wait to return to that life when it was over.

…But this adventure maybe wasn’t that bad, Kenma supposed as he drifted off to sleep.   


End file.
